LA Times Crossword Answers 26 Dec 12, Wednesday

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
1. 1978 co-Nobelist from Egypt SADAT
Anwar Sadat was the third President of Egypt right up to the time of his assassination in 1981. Sadat won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1978 along with Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin for the role played in crafting the Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty of 1978 at Camp David. It was this agreement that largely led to Sadat’s assassination two years later.

6. Bookstore ID ISBN
The International Standard Book Number (ISBN) was invented by one Gordon Foster who is now a professor at Trinity College Dublin in Ireland. The code was originally developed for booksellers, so that they had a unique number (and now a barcode) for each publication.

17. Monteverdi character seeking to bring Euridice back from Hades ORFEO
Monteverdi was a true pioneer. “L’Orfeo” is one of the first operas ever composed. The debut performance of “L’Orfeo” was in 1607 and it is still performed regularly to this day.

18. *”The Golden Girls” actress BEA ARTHUR (letter B)
Actress Bea Arthur’s most famous roles were on television, as the lead in the “All in the Family” spin-off “Maude” and as Dorothy Zbornak in “The Golden Girls”. Arthur also won a Tony for playing Vera Charles on stage in the original cast of “Mame” in 1966, two years after she played Yente the matchmaker in the original cast of “Fiddler on the Roof”.

21. Williams-Sonoma purchases PANS
The Williams-Sonoma company is based San Francisco, California. Williams-Sonoma specializes in selling high-end kitchenware through retail outlets.

28. __ v. Ferguson: 1896 segregation case PLESSY
In 1890 the State of Louisiana enacted Separate Car Act, a statute requiring separate accommodations for African Americans and whites on trains. An alliance of African American and white activists arranged for one Homer Plessy to be arrested for breaking the law, so that they could forward an appeal to the US Supreme Court. However, the plan backfired when the decision of the upper court (Plessy v. Ferguson) led to the doctrine of “separate but equal”, a doctrine that remained in place until it was struck down in 1954 by Brown v. Board of Education.

32. Gem of a Hitchcock film? TOPAZ
“Topaz” is a Hitchcock film released in 1969, a Cold War spy story based on the book of the same name by the great Leon Uris. “Topax” is a little unusual for a Hitchcock work as it doesn’t feature a big Hollywood name, and it wasn’t particularly well received at the box office.

34. Gumbo vegetable OKRA
Gumbo is a type of stew or soup that originated in Louisiana. The primary ingredient can be meat or fish, but to be true gumbo it must include the “holy trinity” of vegetables, namely celery, bell peppers and onion. Okra used to be a requirement but this is no longer the case. Okra gave the dish its name as the vernacular word for the African vegetable is “okingumbo”, from the Bantu language spoken by many of the slaves brought to America.

37. Playbill listing ROLE
I get quite a kick out of reading the bios in “Playbill” as some of them can be really goofy and entertaining. “Playbill” started off in 1884 in New York as an in-house publication for just one theater on 21st St. You can’t see any decent-sized production these days anywhere in the United States without being handed a copy of “Playbill”.

38. Thurman of “Pulp Fiction” UMA
Robert Thurman was the first westerner to be ordained a Tibetan Buddhist monk. Robert raised his children in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition and called his daughter “Uma” as it is a phonetic spelling of the Buddhist name “Dbuma”.

I”m not a big fan of Quentin Tarantino. His movies are too violent for me, and the size of his ego just turns me right off. Having said that, I think “Pulp Fiction” is a remarkable film. If you can look past the violence it’s really well written. And what a legacy it has. John Travolta’s career was on the rocks and he did the film for practically no money, and it turned out be a re-launch for him. Uma Thurman became a top celebrity overnight from her role. Even Bruce Willis got some good out of it, putting an end to a string of poorly received performances.

39. *Traveling EN ROUTE (letter N)
I tend to pronounce the “en” in “en route” more like the word “on” than the letter N …

“En route” is a French term that means “on the way”, and is used the same way that we use the phrase in English.

42. Like a limbo bar, late in the game LOW
The limbo dance originated on the island of Trinidad in the Caribbean. The name “limbo” is an alteration of our word “limber”, which isn’t surprising given what one has to do to get under that bar!

45. Mideast VIP EMIR
An emir is a prince or chieftain, most notably in the Middle East. In English, “emir” can also be written as “amir” and “ameer” (watch out for those spellings in crosswords!).

48. Like chinchillas ANDEAN
A chinchilla is a rodent found in the Andes in South America. The chinchilla is a little larger than a squirrel, and has velvet-like fur. It takes its name from the local Chincha people who made clothing out of the fur. Chinchillas are quite rare in the wild now as they been hunted almost out of existence, but there are plenty of farm-raised chinchillas around supporting the fur industry, sad to say …

50. Beaded counters ABACI
The abacus was used as a counting frame long before man had invented a numerical numbering system. It is a remarkable invention, particularly when one notes that it is still widely used today across Africa and Asia.

67. Oliver’s request MORE
“Please, sir. I want some more.”

“Oliver Twist” is of course a novel by Charles Dickens. It is a popular tale for adaptation to the big screen. There were two silent film versions, in 1909 and 1922, and the first talkie version was released in 1933, with many to follow. The latest “Oliver” for the big screen was a 2005 Roman Polanski production.

68. River past Geneva RHONE
The Rhone river rises in Switzerland and flows through the southeast of France.

Genève (Geneva in English) is the biggest city in the French-speaking part of Switzerland. I’ve been to Geneva only once and sadly, what I remember most is how expensive it is. It is in fact the fourth or fifth most expensive city in the world.

69. Biblical reformer EZRA
Ezra the Scribe, also called Ezra the Priest, is the central character in the Book of Ezra in the Hebrew Bible.

70. Small bit IOTA
Iota is the ninth letter in the Greek alphabet. We use the word “iota” to portray something very small as it is the smallest of all Greek letters.

71. Name spelled out in a canine song, and also by the starts of the answers to starred clues BINGO

There was a farmer who had a dog,
And Bingo was his name-o.
B-I-N-G-O
B-I-N-G-O
B-I-N-G-O
And Bingo was his name-o.

Down
3. “Pour Some Sugar on Me” rockers DEF LEPPARD
Def Leppard is a hard rock band from Sheffield in England. Drummer Rick Allen lost his arm in a car crash, severed by an incorrectly-worn seat belt. With the encouragement of the band, he returned to the lineup by using a specially designed electronic drum set. Amazing indeed …

5. Chinese menu general TSO
General Tso’s chicken is an American creation, often found on the menu of a Chinese restaurant. The name General Tso may be a reference to General Zuo Zontang of the Qing Dynasty, but there is no clear link.

9. Code-breaking org. NSA
The National Security Agency (NSA) was set up in 1952 by President Truman, a replacement for the Armed Forces Security Agency that had existed in the Department of Defense since 1949. The NSA has always been clouded in secrecy and even the 1952 letter from President Truman that established the agency was kept under wraps from the public for over a generation. I really like the organization’s nickname … “No Such Agency”.

11. Dos y dos y dos y dos OCHO
In Spanish, 4 x two (dos) is eight (ocho).

13. Brontë’s Jane EYRE
“Jane Eyre” is of course the novel written by Charlotte Brontë, under the pen name Currer Bell. Over the years, I’ve shared here on my blogs that the “Jane Eyre” story line is a little too dark and Gothic for my taste, but a very persuasive blog reader convinced me to look more at the romantic side of the story and give it a second chance. I watched a wonderful 4-hour television adaptation of the novel made by the BBC a while back and I have to say that because I was focused on the relationship between Jane and Rochester, I was able to push past the Gothic influences (that depress me) so I really enjoyed the story. I thoroughly recommend the 2006 BBC adaptation to fans of the novel.

24. Monk’s title FRA
The title “Fra” (brother) is used by Italian monks. For example, Fra Angelico was an Italian Renaissance painter.

30. Plumlike fruit SLOE
The sloe is the fruit of the blackthorn bush, and is the flavoring that gives gin its distinctive taste.

31. Trees with elastic wood YEWS
Yew is the wood of choice for the longbow, a valued weapon in the history of England. The longbow is constructed with a core of yew heartwood (as the heartwood resists compression) that has a sheath of yew sapwood (as the sapwood resists stretching). The yew was in such demand for longbows that for centuries yew trees were in short supply in Britain and the wood had to be imported from all over Europe.

32. Bass brass TUBA
The tuba is the lowest pitched of all the brass instruments, and one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra (usually there is just one tuba included in an orchestral line-up). “Tuba” is the Latin word for “trumpet, horn”.

33. Yemen neighbor OMAN
Oman lies on the southeast coast of the Arabian Peninsula and is neighbored by the OAE, Saudi Arabia and Yemen. The capital city of Muscat has a strategic location on the Gulf of Oman and has a history of invasion and unrest. Centuries of occupation by the Persians ended in 1507 when the Portuguese took the city in a bloody attack. The Portuguese held Muscat for much of the next one hundred years until finally being ousted by local Omani forces in 1648. A Yemeni tribe invaded the area in 1741 and set up a monarchy that has been in place in Oman ever since.

35. Decorative pond fish KOI
Koi are also called Japanese carp. Koi have been bred for decorative purposes and there are now some very brightly colored examples found in Japanese water gardens.

40. Hawaiian flier NENE
The bird called a nene is a native of Hawaii, and is also known as the Hawaiian goose. The name “nene” is imitative of its call. When Captain Cook landed on the islands in 1778, there were 25,000 nene living there. By 1950, the number was reduced by hunting to just 30 birds. Conservation efforts in recent years have been somewhat successful.

41. 57-Across Morales ESAI
Esai Morales is best known for his role in the 1987 movie “La Bamba”, which depicted the life of Ritchie Valens and his half-brother Bob Morales (played by Esai).

44. Galway “Golly!” BEGORRA
I’ve always thought of “begorra/begorrah” as one of those softened “by God” oaths, like “by golly”. I can’t think of one person back home in Ireland who uses the term though!

Galway is a city on the west coast of Ireland, and is the fourth most populous city in thecountry (after Dublin, Cork and Limerick).

51. Brief diner order? BLT
The BLT (bacon, lettuce and tomato) is the second most popular sandwich in the US, after the plain old ham sandwich.

54. Like a noble gas INERT
An inert gas can be different from a noble gas. Both are relatively non-reactive, but a noble gas is an element. An inert gas on the other hand, might be a compound i.e. made up of more than one element.

56. Canonized fifth-cen. pope ST LEO
The first pope named Leo is now known as Pope Saint Leo the Great. He is famous for meeting with the feared Attila the Hun and persuading him to turn back his invading force that was threatening to overrun Western Europe.

58. French eatery word CHEZ
“Chez” is a French term meaning “at the house of”, which comes from the Latin word “casa” meaning “cottage” or “hut”.

59. Skier’s transport T-BAR
A T-bar is a type of ski lift in which the skiers are pulled up the hill in pairs, with each pair standing (not sitting!) either side of T-shaped metal bar. The bar is placed behind the thighs, pulling along the skiers who remain standing on their skis (hopefully!). There’s also a J-bar, a similar device, but with each J-shaped bar used by one skier at a time.

63. Texter’s “I’ve heard plenty, thanks!” TMI
Too Much Information (TMI)!

64. Texter’s “I’m away for a moment” BRB
Be right back (BRB).

65. Sushi bar tuna AHI
Yellowfin tuna is usually marketed as “ahi”, its Hawaiian name. Yellowfin tuna is one big fish, often weighing over 300 pounds.

Return to top of page

For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across

Down
1. Sharpshooter’s apparatus SCOPE
2. Matrix, e.g. ARRAY
3. “Pour Some Sugar on Me” rockers DEF LEPPARD
4. Wonder AWE
5. Chinese menu general TSO
6. Breaking all the rules IN BAD FORM
7. Act subdivision SCENE
8. Talk a good game BOAST
9. Code-breaking org. NSA
10. Audible snake RATTLER
11. Dos y dos y dos y dos OCHO
12. Ostracize SHUN
13. Brontë’s Jane EYRE
19. Skatepark component RAIL
21. How some amateurs turn PRO
24. Monk’s title FRA
25. Move viscously OOZE
26. Give __ on the back A PAT
29. Continues despite hardship SOLDIERS ON
30. Plumlike fruit SLOE
31. Trees with elastic wood YEWS
32. Bass brass TUBA
33. Yemen neighbor OMAN
35. Decorative pond fish KOI
36. The sticks RURAL AREA
40. Hawaiian flier NENE
41. 57-Across Morales ESAI
44. Galway “Golly!” BEGORRA
47. “That’s nasty!” ICK
49. Dynamic start? AERO-
51. Brief diner order? BLT
53. “Hooray!” WAHOO
54. Like a noble gas INERT
55. Wishing one hadn’t RUING
56. Canonized fifth-cen. pope ST LEO
57. Topnotch A-ONE
58. French eatery word CHEZ
59. Skier’s transport T-BAR
63. Texter’s “I’ve heard plenty, thanks!” TMI
64. Texter’s “I’m away for a moment” BRB
65. Sushi bar tuna AHI

Return to top of page